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A Hacker's Replacement for Gmail

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Re: A Hacker's Replacement for Gmail

#31

Post by sciurus »

LeafStorm wrote: post #13

While I don't necessarily trust an external company with all my emails, I also don't trust myself to maintain the myriad daemons involved in this setup without doing something subtly wrong that results in my server not sending/receiving all the mail it should -- or, worse, being used for spam. What would be useful is a pre-assembled virtual machine image or other form of appliance that allows you to deploy and test a…

Perhaps you'd like something more integrated? There are plenty of projects in this space that are entirely or mostly open source.

http://www.kolab.org/ http://www.sogo.nu/english.html http://www.zarafa.com/ http://www.open-xchange.com/home.html https://www.zimbra.com/

Re: A Hacker's Replacement for Gmail

#32

Post by taeric »

tbrock wrote: post #16

It's definintely time for an open source alternative to GMail... but I think everyone knows this isn't it. These tools like exim, horde, dovecot, etc. have been around and worked for decades but wouldn't it be great to have fresh solutions that weren't so ancient and archaic?

You say ancient and archaic, I see ridiculously well tested and battle worn.

Seriously, what would make a "fresh" solution better than a long standing one, in this case?

Re: A Hacker's Replacement for Gmail

#33

Post by jervisfm »

mbell wrote: post #12
exratione wrote: post #8

Setting up a server in any hosting environment at this point comes with the assumption that its contents can be read at any time by the operators and whoever they let in without you ever knowing about it. That's still a lot better than Gmail. Setting up your own mail server is not a terrible woe-inducing undertaking if you have a working recipe to follow and are comfortable with the Unix command line (e.g. http://www…

> Setting up a server in any hosting environment at this point comes with the assumption that its contents can be read at any time by the operators and whoever they let in without you ever knowing about it. How exactly is that any different than it was 6 months ago?

The point about trusting hosting providers is an interesting one. Indeed, when renting a Virtual Private Server from a service provider, you have no choice but to trust them to keep your data safe.

This made we wonder: would it be possible to actually secure the server in such a manner that the hosting party won't have access to your stuff without your say so ?

I think you can (sort of) do this already with having something like an encrypted virtual server running on the rented VPS. Of course, I don't think this is bullet-proof and you also do have the downside of an additional layer of overhead that comes from further virtualization of your actual server(s).

Re: A Hacker's Replacement for Gmail

#34

Post by mbell »

bigiain wrote: post #23
mbell wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Setting up a server in any hosting environment at this point comes with the assumption that its contents can be read at any time by the operators and whoever they let in without you ever knowing about it. How exactly is that any different than it was 6 months ago?

The difference today is that not only should I assume that Google sysadmins could read my mail, but there's now pretty convincing arguments that Google are sending all my (as a non-US person) email to the NSA - who're storing it forever "just in case it turns out useful". I'm somewhat less concerned about rogue individual sysadmins curiously snooping on my mail, than I am about the NSA's comprehensive perpetual archi…

What? Have you been following this topic at all?

Exactly where are these convincing arguments that google is sending all e-mail to the NSA? Links? Data? Do you have anything that supports this at all?

There is the telephone stuff that was leaked, which has been well known since 2006 [0]. But, where is this miraculous evidence that google is handing everything over to the NSA?

[0] http://yahoo.usatoday.com/news/washington/2006-05-10-nsa_x.h...

Re: A Hacker's Replacement for Gmail

#35

Post by ket »

oijaf888 wrote: post #22
exratione wrote: post #8

Setting up a server in any hosting environment at this point comes with the assumption that its contents can be read at any time by the operators and whoever they let in without you ever knowing about it. That's still a lot better than Gmail. Setting up your own mail server is not a terrible woe-inducing undertaking if you have a working recipe to follow and are comfortable with the Unix command line (e.g. http://www…

Assuming you don't have any sort of console access configured and its a physical server how could they do that without letting you know via at least a reboot?

First, they could always ask your ISP to route a copy of each smtp to their servers.

But this is a bit irrelevant until you solve the social problem: I'm going to guess that >90% of your contacts use gmail/yahoo/hotmail; so the NSA already has 90% of your mail in their databases anyways- until you convince your contacts to install their own email server.

Re: A Hacker's Replacement for Gmail

#36

Post by h2ohno »

voidlogic wrote: post #19

Hmm... It sounds easier to just run an instance of Zimbra community edition in a VM. https://s3.amazonaws.com/uploads.blog.zimbra.com/wp-content/...

This is what I do, but it requires more than a $5/month VPS to run it.

https://www.zimbra.com/docs/os/8.0.2/single_server_install/S...

Re: A Hacker's Replacement for Gmail

#37

Post by captn3m0 »

LeafStorm wrote: post #13

While I don't necessarily trust an external company with all my emails, I also don't trust myself to maintain the myriad daemons involved in this setup without doing something subtly wrong that results in my server not sending/receiving all the mail it should -- or, worse, being used for spam. What would be useful is a pre-assembled virtual machine image or other form of appliance that allows you to deploy and test a…

Bitnami offers a ready-made mail solution with roundcube.[1]

[1]: http://bitnami.com/stack/roundcube

Re: A Hacker's Replacement for Gmail

#39

Post by jrn »

bstx wrote: post #6

Another relatively painless way to set up a mail server on your own box is http://www.iredmail.org . ( + http://z-push.sourceforge.net/soswp/ for ActiveSync push mail) So far I am fairly happy with it.

Does anyone know, if I used z-push for a product, would I be liable for not buying a license from Microsoft, for Exchange ActiveSync? It seems they are fairly litigious with activesync patents.

Re: A Hacker's Replacement for Gmail

#40

Post by kefs »

While k9mail is a must, I suggest linking to the repo, which is usually lightyears ahead of public releases on the Play store.

https://code.google.com/p/k9mail/downloads/list

On a side note, they seem to have just hit v4 two days ago.

Second side note, if you decide to use k9, be sure to turn off the signature under composition settings for each account you add.. it's turned on by default.

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